Liberty or Love! and Mourning for Mourning

Published by Atlas PressBy Robert Desnos. Introduction and translation by Terry Hale.

Mystery, the marvelous, the city of Paris transmuted by love, and Sanglot the Corsair’s pursuit of the siren Louise Lame: these are the essential ingredients of Liberty or Love!, a masterpiece of early Surrealism written by Robert Desnos (1900–1945) and first published in 1924 to immediate acclaim. Characters appear and disappear at whim; they walk underwater and accept the most astounding coincidences with calm nonchalance. This crown jewel of Surrealist eroticism is part hymn to the erotic and part adventure story illumined by the shades of Lautréamont, Jack the Ripper and Sade. Desnos was famously lauded by André Breton--in his First Manifesto of Surrealism--for having come “closest to the Surrealist truth,” and his novel is a dream at once violent and tender--the perfect embodiment, in fact, of the Surrealist spirit: joyful and despairing, and effortlessly scandalous. This new hardback edition also includes Mourning for Mourning, Desnos’ first book--his own selection of his early stories from the “period of sleeping fits” and automatic writing.

Featured image, "Bibendum Michelin," is reproduced from the Introduction to Liberty or Love! and Mourning for Mourning.

Liberty or Love! and Mourning for MourningBy Robert Desnos. Introduction and translation by Terry Hale.

Mystery, the marvelous, the city of Paris transmuted by love, and Sanglot the Corsair’s pursuit of the siren Louise Lame: these are the essential ingredients of Liberty or Love!, a masterpiece of early Surrealism written by Robert Desnos (1900–1945) and first published in 1924 to immediate acclaim. Characters appear and disappear at whim; they walk underwater and accept the most astounding coincidences with calm nonchalance. This crown jewel of Surrealist eroticism is part hymn to the erotic and part adventure story illumined by the shades of Lautréamont, Jack the Ripper and Sade. Desnos was famously lauded by André Breton--in his First Manifesto of Surrealism--for having come “closest to the Surrealist truth,” and his novel is a dream at once violent and tender--the perfect embodiment, in fact, of the Surrealist spirit: joyful and despairing, and effortlessly scandalous. This new hardback edition also includes Mourning for Mourning, Desnos’ first book--his own selection of his early stories from the “period of sleeping fits” and automatic writing.